‘1980s are now calling’ mockery of Romney haunts Obama: Putin takes control in Syria

It was only a few short years ago that President Obama openly mocked Mitt Romney for saying Russia was the greatest geopolitical threat to the America. Certain segments of the media thought his “zinger” was downright hilarious. Fast forward three years and Vladimir Putin has annexed Crimea, is primed to do the same in eastern Ukraine, and put himself in the driver’s seat in Syria.

During the presidential debate on Monday evening, President Barack Obama deployed a Seinfeldian zinger to mock former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential nominee. Romney had said that al Qaeda and other terrorist groups are “rushing in” as revolutions shake up the Muslim world.

“Gov. Romney, I’m glad that you recognize that al Qaeda is a threat,” Obama said, “because a few months ago when you were asked what’s the biggest geopolitical threat facing America, you said Russia.”

“The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back because the Cold War’s been over for 20 years,” Obama said.

What Mr. Obama didn’t realize is that the Cold War never ended for Vladimir Putin, which is odd because the Russian’s public statements have always made that very clear.

Hundreds of Iranian troops have arrived in Syria to join a major ground offensive on behalf of President Bashar al-Assad’s government, sources said on Thursday, a further sign of the rapid internationalization of a civil war in which every major country in the region has a stake.

Russian warplanes bombed a camp run by rebels trained by the CIA, the group’s commander said, putting Moscow and Washington on opposing sides in a Middle East conflict for the first time since the Cold War.

The U.S. and Russian militaries will hold talks at 11 a.m. EDT via video link to seek ways to keep their militaries apart as they wage parallel campaigns of air strikes in Syria, a U.S. defense official said.

Russian jets struck targets near the cities of Hama and Homs in western Syria on the second day of their surprise air campaign, which they launched on Wednesday.

Moscow said it had hit Islamic State positions, but the area where it struck is held by a rival insurgent alliance, which unlike Islamic State is supported by U.S. allies including Arab states and Turkey.

The problem with the Obama administration is that America’s adversaries around the globe telegraph exactly what their intentions are, and yet Mr. Obama and his hand-picked staff refuse to take them at their word.

Arizona Sen. John McCain pointed out this strange behavior out Wednesday on MSNBC with Andrea Mitchell:

“John Kerry and his spokesperson said it is not clear what Russia’s intentions are. It was perfectly clear what Russia’s intentions are!”

A flashback to July 21 shows Kerry was also confused by Iran’s vow to undermine U.S. policy, which was made immediately after agreeing to a nuclear “deal” with the Obama administration.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said a speech by Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on Saturday vowing to defy American policies in the region despite a deal with world powers over Tehran’s nuclear program was “very troubling”.

“I don’t know how to interpret it at this point in time,except to take it at face value, that that’s his policy,” he said in the interview with Saudi-owned Al Arabiya television.

“But I do know that often comments are made publicly and things can evolve that are different. If it is the policy, it’s very disturbing, it’s very troubling,” he added.

Why is Mr. Kerry always confused? Perhaps it is because he mistakes U.S. fallibility (a trait of all nations) with the idea that threats exist because America is, for all intents and purposes, always at fault.

Mitt Romney knew what he was talking about in 2012, and the president sneered at him. The media laughed along with the “Seinfeldian zinger” – but the real joke was on the American people.

The only people who are laughing now are the Russians, the Iranians, the Assad regime and their allies all around the globe.

I'm a former Army guy who believes success comes through hard work, honesty, optimism, and perseverance.
I believe seeing yourself as a victim creates a self-fulfilling prophecy. I believe in God. I'm a USC Trojan with an MA in Political Science from American University.

You may have already seen this and, thus, picked up on the comparison, but I could see you writing an entire post on this. Someone posted an article on their facebook page yesterday about Obama’s press conference after the latest shooting. This is what the article started out saying…

“At a press conference Thursday, President Barack Obama was visibly frustrated with a lack of action from Congress to prevent mass shootings like the one that happened today at Umpqua Community College in Oregon.
‘It cannot be this easy for somebody who wants to inflict harm on other people to get his or her hands on a gun,’ Obama said.”

I immediately thought of how quickly he would say something like this while dogmatically refusing to say the same about Iran concerning Israel. Imagine that same sentence, but replace “a gun” with “a nuclear weapon”.

You make a very interesting point. The president wants to make it harder for law-abiding Americans to exercise their right to self-defense, while making it easier for a nation like Iran (i.e., one that openly calls for the destruction of Israel) to obtain nuclear weapons. Sigh…

I just finished “Relentless Strike: The Secret History of Joint Special Operations Command,” by Sean Naylor. It is a very educational book. I’ll probably do a review sometime in the near future. I don’t suggest reading it if your stomach is turned by some of the odd national security decisions made by Mr. Obama. 🙂

Obama’s fans (including most of the news media) thought he was, like, you know, sooooooo cool with his “1980’s want their foreign policy back” quip. When you are fifteen, flippant one-liners seem terribly sophisticated. And, when you are fifteen, appearing to be sophisticated is very important. (Much more important than qualities like honesty and integrity.) And, emotionally and intellectually, Obama and his fans are about fifteen years old.

So now, Russia asserts itself as a major (and hostile) world power again. And “the J-V team” controls an area larger than Great Britain. But if you question the assumption that Obama is the smartest guy on the planet, you must be a racist.

While Obama was attending college and playing at being a hippie radical, and later, while he was playing at being a “community organizer,” Putin was an officer in the Russian secret service. No wonder Obama is obviously afraid of Putin. Really afraid. As in, needing-to-have-his-diapers -changed afraid.